The Most Powerful U.S. Air Force MX Missile

This is about the design and construction of the LGM-118A Peacekeeper which was land-based deployed by the United States in 1986.

[@caribman10]

I stood on the pad of one of the 10 MIRV's in the Peackeeper missile bus. It was a sobering moment.

[@timothybrummer8476]

I worked at Vandenberg during the MX program. They actually built a road and shelters to test this "shell game" basing concept.

[@georgehunter2813]

Old school.

[@UHK-Reaper]

I found this and one "like it" on google Maps

[@NotMe-hm2zd]

where? i mean i know you said at vandenberg but do you know where about@@UHK-Reaper

[@broncodaddy46507]

Why didn’t we keep the MX and scrap the Minuteman 3s

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

We put these warheads on.minutemen

[@wiffy1346]

the treaty between the us and soviet said no to the peacekeeper, because it could have multiple warheads on a single missile

[@grossersalat578]

these answers are contradicting. Do current minutemens hat 10 warheads or 3 these days? I've heard that the peacekeeper was just too expensive to maintain compare to the Minuteman.

[@georgetincher7859]

@@grossersalat578 The Minuteman III only had 3 warheads back in the day, but are now limited to just a single warhead. The Peacekeeper could carry 10 warheads.

[@grossersalat578]

@@georgetincher7859 Thanks.

[@unassistedsuicide2243]

It’s f’n beautiful

[@terrondt]

Peacekeeper/MX mobile system would have been so cool

[@michaelcap9550]

Now that the treaties are void, bring this back.

[@TheGrindcorps]

@@michaelcap9550 they used them to launch satellites or otherwise destroyed them. Now Russia has a significant edge in nuclear delivery systems. They have to build new missiles now anyway. Would have saved a lot of money and probably have a better missile than they’ll wind up skimping on $ to build now. That’s if we get one because they are so stupid people are saying only have slbm and no triad. Sounds like a very unsafe idea. This would still be best missile in world possibly a fair amount of time in future now.

[@iitzfizz]

Yeah it was a nutty concept, some dr strangelove type shit It was cool that it was a cold launch vehicle though since all the other ICBM's were (and are) hot launch apart from Trident I guess but that's technically an SLBM so it goes without saying.

[@johnruuu]

I worked for the IV&V Prime contractor for all U.S. Strategic Nuclear Weapon Systems Analysis. MX Peacekeeper was one in the Triad. Great system, we fooled the Soviets well.

[@alexei933]

GourmetBushCrafter , молодец, возьми пирожок с полки

[@dieselscience]

I'm sorry we don't speak potato vodka in the land of free speech.

[@alexei933]

Мы - это кто? Ты за себя говори, чучело.

[@dieselscience]

There you go with the drunk gibberish again. You should learn a legitimate language.

[@dieselscience]

@@BARKAS63 I don't care if you are gay. If you like men, that's your business, not mine.

[@custodianfile]

Thank you for your service

[@3melendr]

Some very familiar terrain in this doc.

[@Kit_Bear]

Hi, I'd like to place an order. Can you deliver 20 to my house, I'm just doing a security upgrade. 6 months?! OK, do you take Paypal?

[@michaeltaylor8192]

Processing your order. You should receive them via air drop on or about the 26th of this month. Thank you for your order. Hope they meet your expectations.

[@andyramirez5367]

Do you take EBT?

[@LeicaM11]

Kit Bear Thanks, for your order. Please pay $ 1.4 billion via paypal. Shipping will be free. Please do not litter inside the US.

[@cromlaughsatyourfourwinds8333]

All that money for just 19 years of service. Thanks Air Force!

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

The warheads are still being used idiot

[@cromlaughsatyourfourwinds8333]

@@michaelanthonyg3851 But the rest of the massively expensive missile is'int. Shit for brains.

[@blurglide]

You should look up the Titan 1. MASSIVE underground bases that cost $250M (several billion today) just to support 3 missiles. They were active for less than 4 years.

[@cromlaughsatyourfourwinds8333]

@@blurglide I have. Infuriating! Why couldn't they modify those sites for Titan 2 or Minuteman? It's called the military industrial complex!

[@thomasdunn496]

I don’t think the USAF had a say in the matter. Wasn’t it the folks on the US side that negotiated, signed, and ratified the treaty with the USSR?

[@stephenborst3535]

A major game of bait and switch

[@purplesword5536]

Wasn't the MX retired in 2006???

[@pyromiko]

last alarm of the video sounds like uvb76 number station

[@DrBobaliscious]

Wow! Any MX Crewdogs want to chime in?

[@curmudgeonextraordinaire1884]

What an absolutely convoluted system. No wonder it was rejected.

[@orange70383]

What kind of treaty limits the number of separate warheads of each missile to 10.

[@Chrzysztof]

orange70383 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/START_II

[@myidentityisnotimportantor1261]

orange70383 Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty.

[@southwestxnorthwest]

wrong. Three warheads each.

[@dieselscience]

SALT treaty.

[@PaulvonOberstein]

A treaty that caps missiles but not warheads.

[@huffdaddy3845]

It was like a game of 23 card monte. Pretty ingenious, but terribly expensive.

[@bryanmchugh1307]

I would like 4600 MX missiles please. Got a heck of a stump stuck in my lawn need something heavy.

[@desertfox2403]

Was this missile system fully deployed?

[@solidsnake2112]

desertfox2403 Yes.

[@myidentityisnotimportantor1261]

desertfox2403 Yep, it was our primary ICBM for a pretty good while.

[@solidsnake2112]

I learned that this particular system wasn't utilized in the manner described in the video as it would have used VAST amounts of public land. They instead used that same or similar hardware, and older missile silos combined with other methods such as squat box car chassis for trains. They hardened the older silos for the MX program however. "deep basing" But the MX missile was indeed the state of the art MIRV of the time.

[@myidentityisnotimportantor1261]

SolidSnake2948 Interesting fun fact.Cool.I always figured the govt. would save money, like they always do, by upgrading existing things rather than waste money building something new from the ground up.Unless, of course, that new thing is so advanced there is no practical way to upgrade the old.

[@mookie2637]

+SolidSnake2948 Correct. From memory, the planned deployment would also have consumed at least 75% of the US's entire cement output...

[@Davemphipps]

This is depressing, what is the video 40 years old. This is our latest greatest achievement.

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

Reallymoron i guess youmissed thegiant laser the us has now that.melted a giant ship from 5000.miles away in a test

[@satanofficial3902]

The heavens declare the glory of the Bomb, and the firmament showeth Its handiwork. Glory be to the Bomb, and to the Holy Fallout. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be. World without end. May the Blessings of the Bomb Almighty, and the Fellowship of the Holy Fallout, descend upon us all. This day and forever more. Amen.

[@thetreblerebel]

Amen..

[@terrondt]

Reagan killed this basing sceme

[@thetruth7633]

Dayword : cottonmouth Commandword : trinity Actionword : jericho Full strike please

[@hamaljay]

Launch code:00000

[@bubbajones6907]

@@hamaljay it's four zeros, not five. 0000

[@michaelcap9550]

Might as well bring it back now.

[@ihl8608]

I prefer the pershing 2

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

This missle could destroy 4 countries at the sametime it had decoy warheads and nobody at the time could stop it the warheads i believe were put on other missles

[@ogdocvato]

Michael anthony g MX deployed 10 W-87 thermonuclear warheads. 300 kt with a U-238 tamper. 500 kt with a U-235 tamper.

[@garyzod8818]

Obscene

[@laurenceraiser4064]

I don't understand why we no longer need to test our nuclear bombs. Can anyone explein that to me?

[@caseymatika1113]

Cause it's dangerous to our health.

[@nutsackmania]

+Laurence Raiser Because we tested thousands of them and we know in what conditions they work and what conditions they don't and now use the huge amount of computing power available to test the existing warheads against these conditions.

[@vikingsoftpaw]

+Laurence Raiser Computer are powerful enough to 'virtually test' them.

[@videosuperhighway7655]

+Michael Medley yeah buts what the fun in that. No big white light, big bang and the wind blowing in your face as you watch the beauty of the big mushroom cloud unfold in the sunset.

[@laurenceraiser4064]

Do you think that ''virtually test'' them is effective?

[@KidDynamite6]

they were gonna spend all this money and this gigantic construction undertaking just to for the dont fuck with us factor…crazy

[@mgabrysSF]

Thiokol engines for the win. When you want to nuke-em, use Thiokol bitches!

[@CaptainSisko1972]

Kaboom!

[@VNVgirl]

Bring on the Rail Garrison

[@workingshlub8861]

minuteman 3 and the subs are enough...i get they wanted the soviets to keep guessing but whats better than a sub?

[@ThirstifleGamer]

Shame they had to enact the treaty, these are newer than what is deployed now... don’t break as often

[@justinp9647]

They got rid of them because they were very costly to repair and did break more often. Naturally 10 re-entry vehicles have more moving parts than the 3 warheads a minute man 3 has.

[@GarySmith-up1un]

All this effort over all of these years. Yet it appears America will be destroyed from within by its own children. How disgustingly sad

[@kevinsmith9502]

that's insane the amount of paranoia and crazy shit being done during the cold war.Is it really over or is this just a new chapter in our little nuclear arms race

[@LostAnFound]

How did the resultant nuclear winter pass environmental review? The rationale hits it psychotic peak around minute 12.

[@KKEM641]

"Funny" thing is, in 1981 Reagan nixed the idea of the being in the bunkers, and they ended up in the Minuteman silos instead.

[@garywood5882]

It was cheaper to use existing silos rather than build loads of silos and move the missiles randomly about.

[@juliustheillustrious7727]

Yeah. He called it a 'Rube Goldberg scheme"

[@terrondt]

@@garywood5882 true but the whole idea of the MX multiple basing system was to confuse the Soviet targeting the missiles instead of putting them in vulnerable fixed silos.

[@garywood5882]

@@terrondt That's a good point, I think you're right.

[@brianw612]

Don"t need to physically test nukes any longer, computer algorithms do that very effectively now as I understand things.

[@whatsup7202]

That's for design. Still need a physical test.

[@heinrichmuller7974]

Love that the payload is in accord with treaty limitations:P Ask an Indian about treaties & how much good they really do...

[@hbgarrett45]

What would the new USA NUCLEAR missile Ben likw

[@Csilk]

Probably should use the right nationality though, Indians come from India.

[@dieselscience]

And today, Putin brags about violating SALT treaties.

[@jamesthackeray5422]

Seems very complicated the Shell Game very expensive to do today if you want?

[@BobTheBuilder-ih5en]

And we're allowed to watch this because of the Freedom of Information Act?

[@rogervoss4877]

Never intended to be Secret. Planned for SALT verification ability. Never deployed, but if deployed survivability was planned by the 'shell game' system to multiply targets.

[@adamferguson8781]

Wasn’t the MX nicknamed ‘Peacemaker’?? Sure done it’s job. 👏👏

[@ryanwayson3059]

"Peacekeeper"

[@adamferguson8781]

Ryan Wayson Ahh, yes thank you 👍👍

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

Yes it did its job it was created to prevent a soviet attack on america

[@whatsup7202]

Seems ok, but rather moot with the newer Soviet hypersonic nuclear program. We need to invest much more money in laser/energy-beam defensive weapons. Hypersonics can't get past that...

[@orsonstarbuck]

ICBM Warheads are already hypersonic when reentering the atmosphere

[@ricrusso7347]

@@orsonstarbuck Lasers are traveling at the speed of light, it doesn't matter how fast the warheads are going!!!.

[@michaelanthonyg3851]

Wrong this nuke had hundreds of decoy dummy warheads you could install nothing could stop it today

[@josemedinasgamefowlpage5988]

@@ricrusso7347 a laser cant nuke!!!! Understand?

[@thunderstruck4221]

Yes everyone search nuke map all your questions will be answered.

[@cdtelting]

Still seems vulnerable at initial launch since only one missile is actually launched. Better if there were multiple first stage dummies.

[@evanfinch4987]

+Chris Telting How would they shoot them down during the boost phase in the middle of the American continent?

[@jmck5930]

You are stupid

[@piotrd.4850]

This basing concept killed MX and Midgetman concepts....

[@m.herbert5262]

Whichever country launches first will most likely win.

[@Davethreshold]

Not quite: Both the U.S. and Russia have doomsday rockets. If either country gets ENTIRELY destroyed, it will launch a full strike weeks later.

[@benquinneyiii7941]

Corsair Yak 3

[@slickfinish3261]

T33WDC CLEAR

[@smeltedcheese]

cool

[@edivan241]

Um milhão de mísseis hipersonico deixaria a Rússia debaixo de poeira.

[@MpowerdAPE]

Looks like a logistical nightmare to me.

[@briandspohn5260]

Spohn MX have the shirt

[@laurenceraiser4064]

This is old!

[@The1976spirit]

Each MX vehicle, regardless of wether fake or not, just looks looks like an EMD Class 66 locomotive. The most impressive MX models in H0 scale are made by Mehano in Slovenia. The final fight for world government will be between Fleischmann and Märklin. Be careful, think twice: the world ans motorola count on you: where will you use your transport vehicle?

[@fwix771]

This isn’t hasn’t aged well lol

[@jumperman1773]

Nobody knows what we really have.....

[@ronneltornato2400]

Of course that's military secret

[@jameshalleluyah8133]

Sadly, this system was never fully implemented. Our land based ICBM's are vulnerable to a first strike and that greatly reduces our collective ability to deter enemy attacks.

[@jameshalleluyah8133]

Couldn't agree more.

[@ghostman9028]

+Tyler Brown we can hit em hard still...enouph to deture them....dont kid yourself...our subs are on costant alert..,we dont need another arms build up..we need more intellegent use of what we got...we would roast the ruskies if they steped over the line

[@jameshalleluyah8133]

Our subs can bring the pain, which is good. Still, I want the full triad up and strong.

[@ghostman9028]

Tyler Brown interesting opinion on the British they have allways tried rideing off of our success i know...espeacialy in modern times

[@ghostman9028]

Tyler Brown an russia is at odds with us because of our inability to share in the spoils of the new millenium..we cant be the world police anymore..we cant afford it

[@babykevinxoxo]

Bush jr got rid of these what a weak President

[@dieselscience]

It was actually Bush Sr. Bush Jr. saved them from being scrapped and repurposed them into Minotaur rockets.

[@ogdocvato]

GBSD is coming. It should have better capabilities.

[@kathleenoldham9544]

Only us stupid enough to agree to a treaty

[@PatrickCrossfire.]

We had 50 of these up until 2005 when the U.S. foolishly decommisioned all of them. Another stupid and short sighted move by the Government.

[@tealc6218]

14:02 7ft tall blue alien wearing a hijab spotted at the pentagon.

[@shanwi14yearsago51]

LOL

[@manassurya2019]

Why didn't they just make a road mobile missile like the Russians?

[@VNVgirl]

they do mention it here ground mobile system

[@juandiegosapotec]

"We have devised every possible option to ensure MAD, just incase you were worried nuclear warfare would spare anything living"

[@whatsup7202]

Much on Earth would still be alive even given a massive nuclear exchange.

[@PaulvonOberstein]

Without nuclear deterrence, we would have fought a third world war that would have made WWII look like a picnic.

[@jamesallen3799]

Working on tooling before it was through congress. Just making parts to earn money to go to college.

[@rev.andyh.1082]

This video unwittingly demonstrates the dawning obsolescence of land based ICBMs as a survivable retaliatory option. I have good friends that worked on this program; and I’m glad the MX was cancelled. The Trident III, D5 SLBM is all the nuclear deterrence America needs.

[@curious5887]

Russia still using silo based ICBM and have mobile ICBM launcher and China are still building new silo for their new Land Based ICBM, though i respect your friend for working in MX program, and MX program isn’t cancelled, it was retired because of expensive to operate and the START treaty

[@PaulvonOberstein]

>The Trident III, D5 SLBM is all the nuclear deterrence America needs. The Russians and Chinese disagree. Anyway, deterrence is about making your opponent's decision calculus as complex as possible, which the triad does far more effectively than a monad would.

[@SIRROSLYNPARKS]

Crazy ! Who in the hell came up with this ! hahahaah Tax Payer Nightmare !

[@JdDiehl]

Well some f these rockets may come in handy in our upcoming war with North Korea

[@richardhall9815]

You are aware we've decommissioned all of our Peacekeeper missiles, right?

[@richardhall9815]

I agree.

[@dieselscience]

They're all Minotaur rockets now - now warheads.

[@julietolasquite2326]

Hahahaha akala seguro nang China at Russia sila lang ang may malalaking missile ,,

[@DFWTF]

Search NUKE MAP you wont be disappointed .

[@jimbrausky]

ol fashion narrator. this must be an ol vid. outdated

[@dieselscience]

"Outdated" because the narrator is speaking correct English? ... OK.

[@PaulvonOberstein]

@@dieselscience Didn't you know? Narrators who uptalk or use zoomer speak are more credible.

[@dieselscience]

@@PaulvonOberstein 😆

[@charleyvarrick3627]

Trillion's of dollars spent for 'just in case' !!!!

[@Traftanimal]

why are we still spending unspeakable amounts of money on this. before you reply we have tactical nukes that we would definitely use first.

[@ogdocvato]

Read Herman Kahn's books: "On Thermonuclear War" and "On Escalation".

[@southwestxnorthwest]

This was back in the 80s and 90s. MX was decommissioned in the early 2000s

[@dieselscience]

Uh....this was in the 1970s... I think you have some reading to do.

[@billpugh58]

pointless waste of effort. the MX even looked obselete and undeployable when it was in developement. shame so many people wasted so much of their lives on it.

[@moparmonte8777]

SINCE 1980~MX is far more advanced SINCE technology has progressed. With only 30% of the Cost, The other 70% was & is IN THE POCKETS OF THE TOP 8 BILLIONAIRE ELITE!!! They have it cause they can. "STILL," It satisfies THEIR POWER & THEIR AGENDA!!! It STILL gose on.

[@kurtbjorn]

waah. Those evil rich people... Get over it. Better yet, get rich yourself, then you will find out what it is like for the Gov. to take 50%, 60%, or more. And to have welfare scratch-lottery junkies spend it on booze and crack.

[@JDA2185]

Wrong. The most powerful ICBM the US ever developed was the Titan II. It carried a 9 megaton nuclear warhead. The Peacekeeper could only carry a total explosive power of 3 megatons. Plus, the Titan II was significantly larger so even more powerful ICBM could've been built based off of it. Similar or even more powerful than the soviet SS-18. This could have been done during the 1960s. But back then the US had a completely uninterested administration plus, after 1964 a treasonous administration. The latter was far more interested in fighting a useless, unwinnable war in southeast Asia and creating absurdly wasteful AND DAMAGING socialist programs. Damaging for both the US economy and society...

[@MikeMizz]

The Titan 2 if I remember was liquid fueled, hypergolic actually. So was the MX, Russian was scared AF of the MX and then all the peace activist, and then the basing. We shoulda kept it, but now we have the Sentinel which, if it's ever made, will be a pretty good missile ( if there even such a thing) mankind and his warlike crap